President Donald Trump signed a major Dodd-Frank rollback into law Thursday, hoping to bring regulatory relief to community banks across the U.S. The president explained Dodd-Frank’s costly regulations gave large banks a negative advantage at the cost of small banks throughout the country. Click the headline to read more.

On the heels of an S&P report affirming MBIA's AAA insurer rating, and giving a similar stamp of approval to Ambac, HW's received more than a few emails questioning the stress test used to give both monolines a top grade.
One reader noted in an email to us:

We're not kidding - an HW reader forwarded this listing search to us, and we're sharing.
For those that haven't worked in the REO side of the biz before, there has been a sort-of inside joke about when the first $100 house will hit the market. Unfortunately, it's no longer a joke.

ServiceLink, a cog in the giant machine that is Fidelity National Financial, said Tuesday that former E*Trade operations director Dave Steinmetz joined the firm, where he'll head up ServiceLink's default title and closing operations.
At E*Trade, Steinmetz managed pretty much the entire mortgage biz, from the looks of the press release. He ran mortgage operations, wholesale and retail post-closing departments and handled the company's offshoring initiatives.

Countrywide Financial cancelled a client relations event for its top correspondent lenders after the Wall Street Journal put a bright light on the ritzy plans, which included rooms for approximately 30 bankers at the Ritz in Avon, Colorado.

You know, here at HW, we remember the housing boom well.
In particular, we remember local community groups targeting lenders for 'redlining' because lower-income (read: less credit worthy) borrowers weren't getting a shot at participating in the "historic housing boom." We also remember how everyone looked to the Homeownership Preservation Foundation as a beacon for how foreclosure prevention should work, because GMAC went out of its way to partner with and help fund the nonprofit's efforts.

Are we the only ones that have noticed that the NAR's president is named Richard Gaylord? He's even managed to take up some common short-hand for other famous Richards out there -- like Richard Nixon, for example, who was known famously as 'Tricky Dick.'
(We're tempted to call Gaylord the NAR's chief Dick, but that might be crossing some sort of line.)

The powers that be here at HW have been busy focusing on getting a new Web site launched today (you'll see it starting this weekend). But market rumors keep moving around, with the craziest being that Bank of America is looking to buy UBS. We're not kidding.
Just read the speculation over at FT Alphaville. Sounds as if they're as cynical as we are here in the HW newsroom about the alleged deal.

Fidelity National Real Estate Solutions, touting its Cyberhomes.com property information Web site, put out a press statement Wednesday discussing an analysis of the home values for lead and supporting actor and actress Oscar nominees. Tommy Lee Jones was the winner, and we'd hope the winning streak stops there; Daniel Day Lewis deserves the trophy in 2008.

This month inHousingWire magazine

He wears t-shirts to his televised interviews; not very CEO. He played sports at a high level, but rarely brings it up and when he does he talks about it as a mere chapter in his life. Honestly, who plays a Super Bowl and doesn’t describe it as the defining moment in their personal journey? Casey Crawford, that’s who. His family is a big part of his life of course, but he talks about his even larger family — his coworkers — in terms that are just as glowing.

Feature

One of the things that has bedeviled mortgage financing post-crisis has been the absence of the private label mortgage backed securities market. During the peak years, private label MBS issuance topped $1 trillion. In 2017, only $70 billion of private label RMBS were issued, although that is a big increase from 2016.

Commentary

Digital technology has disrupted businesses and industries from publishing to public transportation, so can the mortgage industry be far behind? Actually, anyone who’s applied for a mortgage recently will have recognized that things are already changing fast.